


Antithesis

by sparklebitca



Category: Queer as Folk (US)
Genre: M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-01-10
Updated: 2019-01-10
Packaged: 2019-10-07 13:18:33
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 945
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/17366579
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/sparklebitca/pseuds/sparklebitca
Summary: Opposite Week at Gus's preschool makes Brian do some thinking and stuff.  Set end of Season 3, I guess?





	Antithesis

**Author's Note:**

> written around 2004

Lindsay tells him, in their weekly Gus-update phone conversation, that it’s Opposites Week at preschool. The parents’ newsletter suggests re-enforcing concepts at home – what’s the opposite of up? What’s the opposite of asleep? What’s the opposite of happy?

What’s the opposite of pathetic? he asks asininely, and Lindsay retorts by asking him the opposite of crass, and the opposite of enhanced child development. He responds that this conversation has completely fucking deteriorated, and that if she has nothing more interesting to say about his son’s pre-primary education, which, by the way, is greatly subsidized by himself, then he will hang up the fucking phone and get on with his day.

They exchange a few more pleasantries – her term, not his – about the economy (or lack thereof), and job prospects (or lack thereof), and she tells him that she loves him and that he’s doing a good job, and he basically tells her the same thing, except that he throws in a few insults regarding Melanie, and they say goodbye.

Well, that’s taken care of, he thinks, and now he doesn’t know what the fuck to do. He sent resumes out over the last few days, so it’s too soon to call about those. He’s got several meetings with networking colleagues over the next few days, but that’s not today. Justin’s been taking care of the comic store while Mikey is off on his little adventure escapades, but he’s hardly in the mood to go see Justin for no real good reason, and he’ll be coming by for dinner anyway, so screw that. He’ll dine on pussy before he’ll visit Ted in rehab again, and since Emmett is plastered to Ted’s side like a used condom to a linoleum floor, he has no viable options as to shooting the shit. It’s coffee and the paper again. He smiles grimly. Brian Kinney, reduced to reclusivity. Who’d have thought it?

He brews a pot of Columbian roast while he showers. He lathers, he rinses, he towels off. He dresses, he pours a cup of coffee – mundane as hell, but it can’t all be weed laced with speed and glow-sticks ‘till 3 am. No matter how hard you try, you can never fully escape life’s mundanities. He doesn’t always mind this, but he usually does.

He skims the paper with little interest. A candlelight vigil downtown in remembrance of September 11th. Justin was making noise about wanting to go to that – well, maybe he’ll go with him and maybe he won’t. Nothing national of interest, except for that farce in California. Nothing local of interest, so what else is new?

Having finished his coffee, he goes to the bedroom, and for lack of anything really better to do, he rolls a joint. He doesn’t light it though; he throws himself down on the bed, and out of some random whim, switches on the red lights over the headboard. He lies there, staring up at the crimson glow, and lets his mind wander.

Fucking Opposites Week. This is what his dwindling capital was going towards. Couldn’t they teach preschoolers not to shit their pants? Or to cut their own food up? He could teach Gus all about fucking opposites – look, Sonny Boy. Mommy 1 – good. Mommy 2 – evil. There you go, kid’s all set.

The red lights burn into his retinas, but he doesn’t move, or look away, or shield his eyes from the glare.

Lindsay and Melanie are opposites in many ways, but they work, albeit in a really fucked-up sense. The same goes for all the couples he knows – he still couldn’t quite figure out Ben and Mikey - but he refuses to necessarily subscribe to old clichés featured in Paula Abdul songs. After all, while he and Justin were distinct polarities three years ago, when they began this whole crapshoot, don’t they work so much better now that they’re acting in tandem? Approaching it all with similar attitudes makes for less stress for him, less sorrow for Justin. Opposites may attract, but sames have a more phenomenal sex life than ever. And also a strange kind of symbiosis, a familiarity free of frustration. It’s effortless now. It’s not so fucking frantic – except for the actual fucking, of course. Thank god.

The red blurs into orange, back into red, casting shadows on the covers, on his chest and face.

He thinks on hate. They’ve both been on the receiving end of that – who hasn’t, right? Hate, and all that the little green Jedi master claimed that it entails. Fear. Suffering. And pain, shit yeah, they’ve both had their share, more than their share, internal and external, emotional and physical, personal and professional. The life of a proud fag isn’t all rainbows and dildos, that’s for fuckin’ sure. But all that shit, all that baggage, it hasn’t killed him, or Justin. Or him and Justin.

And where do you go from that? Where are they, what have they become? The opposite of pain is? Suffering, fear? The opposite of hate?

He won't tell Justin the answers to these questions, but he will never, never stop answering them.

He reaches up, flicks the switch to send the red lights burning into blue. He reaches over, grabs a lighter, sparks up the joint. Inhales a deep drag. Smirks to think of Lindsay and Melanie explaining the opposite of Gus-has-two-mommies. Smiles to think of them, and him, and Justin, and everyone, teaching Gus the opposite of conventional. Of linear. Of defined. Of expected.

The unexpected. In a nutshell.

There you go, kid’s all set.

He never expected it, but he figures that the opposite of Justin is nothing he cares to ever know.


End file.
